"Squeeze" is the third episode of the first season of the American science fiction television series The X-Files. It premiered on the Fox network on September 24, 1993. "Squeeze" was written by Glen Morgan and James Wong and directed by Harry Longstreet, with Michael Katleman directing additional footage. The episode featured the first of two guest appearances by Doug Hutchison as the mutant serial killer Eugene Victor Tooms, a role he would reprise in "Tooms". "Squeeze" is the first "monster-of-the-week" episode of The X-Files, unconnected to the series' overarching mythology.
The show's main characters are FBI agents Fox Mulder (David Duchovny) and Dana Scully (Gillian Anderson), who work on cases linked to the paranormal, called X-Files. Mulder is a believer in the paranormal, while the skeptical Scully has been assigned to debunk his work. In this episode, Mulder and Scully investigate a series of ritualistic killings by somebody seemingly capable of squeezing his body through impossibly narrow gaps. The agents deduce that their suspect may be a genetic mutant who has been killing in sprees for ninety years.
Production of "Squeeze" was problematic; creative differences between Longstreet and the crew led to him being replaced as director, while some missing scenes needed to be shot after the initial filming. Because of these issues, the completion of the episode relied on post-production techniques. However, "Squeeze" has received positive reviews from critics and the episode has subsequently been described by The Star as "the episode that really sold The X-Files idea to the masses". Academics have examined "Squeeze" for its portrayal of the politics of law enforcement, highlighting the tension—evident throughout the series—between the agents' desire to find the truth and their duty to secure criminal convictions.
Plot
In Baltimore, businessman George Usher arrives at his office building. He is watched from a storm drain by someone who then infiltrates the building by climbing through the elevator shaft into the ventilation system, kills Usher, and removes his liver.
Usher's murder, the latest of three, is assigned to careerist FBI agent Tom Colton (Donal Logue), who turns to Dana Scully (Gillian Anderson) for help. Colton is baffled by the lack of entry points at the crime scenes and by the apparent removal of the livers with bare hands. Fox Mulder (David Duchovny) notes their similarity to earlier murder sprees from 1933 and 1963. At the scene, he notices an elongated fingerprint on the air vent, which he finds to be similar to some documented in the X-Files. He concludes that because five murders occurred during the earlier sprees, the investigators should expect two more.
Because Scully believes that the killer will return to the scenes of his earlier crimes, she and Mulder wait in the parking garage of the office building. There, they catch a man named Eugene Victor Tooms (Doug Hutchison) climbing through the air vents. Tooms is given a polygraph test, which includes questions written by Mulder linking him to murders dating as far back as 1903. Tooms passes most of the test, but crucially fails Mulder's questions placing Tooms at the historical murders. However, Colton dismisses Mulder's queries and lets Tooms go. To prove his assertion to Scully, Mulder digitally elongates and narrows Tooms' fingerprints, showing that they match the prints at the crime scene. He believes that Tooms is able to stretch and squeeze his body through narrow spaces. That night, Tooms demonstrates this by squeezing down a chimney to claim another victim.
Mulder and Scully find no documentation on Tooms' life. They visit retired detective Frank Briggs (Henry Beckman), who recounts his investigation into the 1933 murders. Briggs brings out old photographs of Tooms—who has not aged in sixty years—and gives them the address of Tooms' former apartment building. There, Mulder and Scully find a "nest" constructed out of newspaper and bile in the building's crawl space, as well as several trophy items taken from past victims. Mulder suspects that Tooms is a mutant who can hibernate for thirty years at a time after consuming five human livers. As the two leave, Tooms, who is hiding in the rafters, stealthily takes the necklace Scully is wearing as a new trophy.